Monosynaptic connections between muscle spindle (Ia) afferents and motoneurons (MNs), the central portion of the stretch reflex circuit, are highly specific, but the mechanisms underlying this specificity are primarily unknown. In this study, we report that embryonic overexpression of neurotrophin-3 (NT3) in muscles disrupts the development of these… (More)

Two factors, the ETS transcription factor ER81 and skeletal muscle-derived neurotrophin-3 (NT3), are essential for the formation of muscle spindles and the function of spindle afferent-motoneuron synapses in the spinal cord. Spindles either degenerate completely or are abnormal, and spindle afferents fail to project to spinal motoneurons in Er81 null mice;… (More)

Vessel segmentation in retinal fundus images is a preliminary step to clinical diagnosis for some systemic diseases and some eye diseases. The performances of existing methods for segmenting small vessels which are usually of more importance than the main vessels in a clinical diagnosis are not satisfactory in clinical use. In this paper, we present a… (More)

Conjugative transposons are integrated DNA elements that excise themselves to form a covalently closed circular intermediate. This circular intermediate can either reintegrate in the same cell (intracellular transposition) or transfer by conjugation to a recipient and integrate into the recipient's genome (intercellular transposition). Conjugative… (More)

c-Jun N-terminal kinase (JNK) is implicated in cell death in neurodegenerative disorders and has been taken as a critical point between the physiological and pathological status. JNK specific inhibitor SP600125 has been found to have a protective effect against transient brain ischemia/reperfusion-induced neuronal death in rat hippocampal CA1 region. Former… (More)

The phenotype of biological systems can be represented by a space of traits, for example, macroscopic morphology, physiology , behavior, and, more recently, material properties, which are governed by natural selection through the adaptations to species-specifi c habitats in order to achieve multiple functions. [ 1–3 ] Biological exoskeletons, for example,… (More)

Many species rely on diverse selections of entirely organic photonic structures for the manipulation of light and the display of striking colours. Here we report the discovery of a mineralized hierarchical photonic architecture embedded within the translucent shell of the blue-rayed limpet Patella pellucida. The bright colour of the limpet's stripes… (More)

The mitogen-activated protein (MAP) kinase of Chinese hamster ovary cells (CHO mu66 cell line) transfected to express mu-opioid receptors was markedly activated by mu agonists. The rank order of effectiveness of agonists was approximately the same as the rank order of their binding affinities to the mu receptor. The delta and kappa receptor-specific… (More)